A new approach for a new era

We are currently in the middle of one of the worst recessions since the 1930s, writes Jim Gee of Macintyre Hudson LLP. The International Monetary Fund estimates that financial institutions will have to write off a total of US$4.1 trillion of assets; UK unemployment has increased by 753,000 over the last twelve months, to reach 2.38 million; 150,000 bankruptcies are forecast for 2009; public expenditure reductions of between 10-15% are predicted and our economy has shrunk by 4.9% since the first quarter of 2008. This is affecting our work as counter fraud specialists. We need to understand the changing nature and extent of the threat that we face and to be clear about what we can do.

Jim Gee (+44 (0) 207 429 4184, Jim.Gee@mhllp.co.uk) is Director of Counter Fraud Services for Macintyre Hudson LLP and Chair of the Centre for Counter Fraud Studies. During more than 25 years as a counter fraud specialist, he led the team which cleaned up London Borough of Lambeth in the late 1990s; advised the House of Commons Social Security Select Committee on fraud; advised Rt. Hon. Frank Field M.P. during his time as Minister of State for Welfare Reform; was CEO of the NHS Counter Fraud Service and founding Director-General of the European Healthcare Fraud and Corruption Network; and worked as a senior advisor to the Attorney General on the Government’s Fraud Review.

I was in Australia in October last year to speak at the conference of Australian Health Insurers. I arrived shortly after the collapse of Lehman Brothers on 16 September. In the five days I was there US share prices fell by 17%. I can remember arriving jet-lagged after a 26-hour flight from the UK, being unable to sleep and turning on the television. The US Bloomberg financial channel was on. A succession of senior bankers appeared saying things like ‘It’s the end of the world as we know it’. I turned the television off thinking that perhaps it was just the jet-lag, only to turn it back on in time to hear another one say ‘We’re all doomed!’. Panic was in the air.